Acoustic Rhythm
by Taak
Summary: The reality was, he no longer loved you. Knowing that you will still try, because it was better than being alone and damaged. AU/KiddxLaw
1. Chapter 1

**AU/KidxLaw**

* * *

There was the bruised cheek, going purple. The disturbing shades of hurt blue and sick red, dark scratches crystal clear on the tips of abused lips. A bloodied nose and a dark purple eye- but he was smiling. Trafalgar Law was standing, with a big bright smile on his face outside Kid's door of his apartment at dead midnight.

Eustass had nothing much to say, his expression stiff and withering at the sight of a very pathetic Law. He looked exceptionally worthless tonight.

"Hello." The man chirps cheerfully, both hands waving with a cute circular motion through the cold night air. Kid takes note of the fourth finger on Law's hands, the one jutting out in an odd angle- _adorable, _he mutters quietly inside his head.

"Hi. Bye." Two words he offered to the darker man, attempting to close the damn front door in his face. The door was frankly the only protection he had between himself and the lunatic of a man named Trafalgar Law. However the door severely disappoints him when it proves useless due to one lean leg wedging itself in between the closing space.

Kid briefly wonders if he should just crush the door to close along with the leg. Unfortunately no matter how controversial, the man's legs were highly attractive assets. It would sort of be a waste, really. So the pale man lets out a pale sigh, accompanied by a particle of his soul.

"Trafalgar." Kid mutters between his teeth, allowing Law to squeeze his face through the space of a nearly closed door, blinking up at Kid with a sheepish little grin.

"May I please have the permission to enter your domain, Mister Eustass?"

Whether or not his choice of words was highly polite, somehow what Kid thought he heard was "_Open the fucking door, Eustass._"

"No." The owner of the domain answers curtly, Kid slaps his own face with his palm when Law makes the puppy eyes at him. How can those lifeless pair of dry grey eyes, the very representation of 'cynical' be even capable of making that look? That was downright cheating.

Kid grunted in distress. "Pretty please," Law cooed, "With a cherry on top?"

There were those times when Kid just had to reflect on his life and search for the reason, what he has ever done to land him in this situation. The face only brings up memories he was only starting to forget after so much effort. It was unpleasant to have them back.

"Have a heart Eustass."

"It's hard to have one when you're Trafalgar Law, Trafalgar Law."

"Oh- ha ha, Mister Eustass. Really now."

Another short grunt before Kid opens the door with a very clear frown on his face. His arms remove themselves from the door with a certain amount of doubt, but he certainly wasn't expecting Law to fall through the door and smack himself down the floor face first.

Law groans his discomfort, squirming on the floor to get his body around.

"You know," he starts, looking deeply inside the handsome scarlet eyes the other man has. "You're not still angry at me are you?"

"I still hate you. What's wrong with your leg?" Kid peers over the side, bending over with a scowl plastered to his face. Scowls scowls, those seem to be the only expression Law has seen on the other's face for a long time. "Pity, I still love you. That leg is kind of dislocated right now, help me up."

Now that Kid thought about it, Trafalgar Law was in some ways, a very abstract person. Untrue, filled with riddles and lies. Kid was directly the opposite, blunt and straightforward. He wanted to say something he'll say it no matter who the other person was. Law was different when he wanted to say something, he calculates. He calculates your answers, measures each one carefully to hear the answer that he only wants to hear.

Kid hated his way of functioning. Trafalgar Law never asks- he always guesses. Just because there might be a reply that he doesn't want to hear. So he was just averting the reality of it all in the end.

_I still hate you. _A pale arm reaches out to grab the darker man's shoulders; Kid can't help noticing the ugly red marks that runs down the slender neckline. Like deformed flowers, they decorate the surface of Law's skin that show just slightly when he moves, through the loose spaces through his shirt. They were as red as roses, and ugly like blood sprayed upon weed.

Kid suppresses his urge to find himself a knife to dig out those marks.

Being dragged like a ragdoll didn't really offend Law, who came across quietly when Kid just lifted his body up and dumped him on his shoulders. It was nice to know that Kid still had a very dependable physique, just like how he remembered from… Grey eyes blink, unable to remember the answer he was trying to get to.

How long did he abandon Kid? Somehow the thought saddened Law, who tenderly rubbed the back of his hand against the pale cheeks; Kid stiffens at the familiar softness. Those were the same slender fingers, the feeling, the kindness, and the love.

It was all gone in a puff of smoke, almost magical.

Pushing them out was hard, but Kid will manage. He always did. There was no reason when he abandoned him, there was no validity, no conclusion. All there was was a single variable named Trafalgar Law.

"I still love you." Law repeats, there was a heavy strain on the back of his ribs when he felt his body getting lowered down onto a soft surface. Muddled and covered entirely with the scent of the man, on his bed, staring into those scarlet eyes that return his smile with a frown. There was no reply from Eustass Kid.

"Do you still hate me?"

Kid nods.

"I wished you were dead."

Those words, hurts more than reality.

* * *

**A/N **First fic, and really I wasn't trying to make it depressing. Thank you all for reading! You are very wonderful people :)

P.S Thank you for the wonderful reviews, I have fixed some errors included in the chapter.


	2. Chapter 2

**AU/KidxLaw/M (Rated for later chapters/mature content)**

* * *

The candle burns. It burns like rage, it burns like anger. A thousand candles, each one lit with individual hate. They glow in the dark, filling the empty room with fire to welcome the dead. He sees the dead, lying on her coffin, as silent as a corpse. She was a corpse. Once so beautiful, now she was just a lump of cold meat placed between narrow walls. The man extends a hand, this tattooed fingers weaving through her lifeless hair.

Her skin is now only cold plaster white, without life and movement. Her corpse, her memory that remains in her shell left behind.

Her eyes stare at him with a pitiful grudge. Oh her eyes, her eyes.

Trafalgar Law stamps on her eyes.

* * *

Waking up with a sudden snap, his body feels aloof only before it becomes overwhelmed by the sudden pain that drips heavily over his whole body. As soon as his lips open to let out a breath, he is greeted by the three most common things in his life- pain, exhaustion, and an empty room.

Blinking always helped him concentrate when his mind was a little distant from the world. His mind plays tricks on him as he tries to figure out if the thing he was staring at was a pillow or a face carved on white. Ignoring his stiff neck, Law shuffles his body up to find himself being weighed down by several thick layers of blankets. He must comment on how ugly the blankets are, their murky colors unappealing to his eyes.

It was amusing to know that Kid apparently presumed he could kill him by suffocating him with a pile of blankets. A part of Law was thankful that at the least the man did not dump him outside the couch, he hated the cold. Remembering how he passed out right after Eustass finished bandaging his arm; Law looks at the poor effort on the first aid that was now constricting his broken fingers.

His body smelled a little like pain balm. Trafalgar cringes at the familiar scent. Looking at the time, the numbers indicated it was already deep through the cold night of 3 am. It also helped remind him that he was lying shirtless and half naked in Eustass Kid's empty bed.

Law sniffed.

Getting out of the bed proved difficult than he'd thought, his body was in a crumbling state and the night was colder than he imagined when he stepped outside the blanket's warmth. He had an urge to just crawl back into the bed under the ugly blankets and experiment whether or not Kid's method of murder would actually work, but that pang of nostalgia at the thought of Eustass Kid forced him to get out of the room in search for the pale man.

It wasn't such a tedious task, all Law had to do was follow the sound of Kid's television that echoed through the hallway and into the living room. He always used to complain how Kid always slept with the TV on.

Dim lit blue fills the dark living room, almost eerie when looked at a particular perspective. Trafalgar barely makes a noise as he glides across the untidy space, careful not to trip over an empty can of red bull. He found Eustass Kid sprawled over his velvet sofa with the remote control hanging from the ends of his fingers, ready to slip. Gradient of the light spawned from the live television screen casts a shadow over his distinct shape.

Typical of Eustass to sleep with his channel stopped on discovery. Law chuckles at the sleeping man, lowering himself down quietly. He's careful not to wake him up until silently inviting himself into Kid's arms under the blankets. A sleepy growl rumbles through Kid's throat, his eyes half open at the movement beside him. The redhead does not object at the bundle squeezing in beside his body, the soft raw skin exposed to his own and beside each other.

Kid grunts, allowing the thin arms that coil around his chest. "If you're not going to use the bed" Eustass rumbles in his sleepy voice, "Allow me to return to my bed."

Law gives off a sound that was a cross between a giggle and a half hearted sneer.

"It would've been much nicer if you joined me on the bed."

"You're just being really annoying now."

"Do you honestly hate me, or are you just making yourself believe that?" It was a genuine moment of curiosity, Trafalgar's one serious question when he already kind of expected what answer he would receive. A quarter of him was, weirdly enough, desperate.

Oh how deep and low he has fallen.

"Mister Eustass." Law calls, "Kid." He finishes. It was a barely audible whisper that keeps repeating inside his head. He could do this forever if the other tolerated him, much to his disappointment, it wasn't going to happen.

"Don't try my patience Trafalgar. I'm already pushing it by letting you in my house."

Closing his eyes again, Eustass Kid forces himself to dream. It's hard to do it though, when a hand was weaving through his personal barrier so easily to caress his cheeks. It brings back that feeling, that forgotten particle of what he once considered as the thing he most cherished in his life.

The fingers brush against his lips, his cheeks, under his eyes and his nose. With a quiet shift, warm lips plant a soft peck on the tip of his sharp nose line. It's so sweet that it makes him want to throw it all back up. It makes you vomit, hideous and deformed. Something unwanted draws up his anger, and yet he cannot bring himself to reject it.

It was only old memories now. He had no reason to be angry, that was childish. But denying his anger was hard.

A pale arm responds at the touch, shooting up and hesitant only for a second before they aggressively pull down at the back of the other man's slender neck, hooking it and forcing it down. Scarlet eyes glare into the colorless orbs, only the dull pupils returns his gaze. The eyes never change.

"Eustass. Why did you let me in?" the man asks, his grey iris reflecting nothing. Kid feels the beating of a live heart against the warm flesh of Law's neck, that rhythm that sounds like clockwork. Like metronome.

Kid doesn't have an answer for something he doesn't know. He stopped caring a long time ago, five years infact.

"I know you want me dead. Seeing as you're still angry, you're not satisfied even after you killed me."

His whisper sounds so soft beside his ears, it tickles unpleasantly. Kid continues to glare, his fingers squeezing hard on the soft flesh.

"You're alive." Eustass answers.

"You did a shit job of trying to kill me." A low chuckle escapes between the darker man's lips. The distance closes between the two lips, bringing along that scent of something sharp and tangy. "Eustass Kid. You broke my arms, you broke my ribs. You nearly succeeded cracking my neck, I nearly went blind. On top of all that, you shot me, blowing a pretty little circular hole in my stomach."

Law purrs, lifting his body slightly to let the light uncover his scar in the darkness. His legs coil around Kid's own, the man lowers slowly to force the past wound on his lower stomach to touch with the other's skin. The ugly lines of pale red that decorated his olive skin felt almost obscene.

"Eustass Kid. You broke my heart. You tore it to pieces. I allowed you to hurt me."

Kid breathes. One, two three. Eins, zwei, drei. Un, deux, trois. Unno, due, tre. Uno, dos, tres.

He feels the breath meeting the rhythm of his own. A part of him wants to lash out and finish murdering the man. He wanted to kill him. He wanted to crush every single part of him.

And yet those eyes remind him of something old. It was the same eyes that said the exact same words, "Because I love you."

"I already said it clearly, I still hate you. Why do you keep provoking me, Trafalgar? I'm not going to kill you twice."

"Why? You say you hate me, but this is just the same as before. We're still like lovers." Law cooed, rubbing his own nose against Kid's nose. It was pure affection. Sadly, it was a rejected affection.

The eyes that glare return none of the affection given. Kid snarls his feelings towards Law's face, his fangs drawing out to repress the urges of hate. This was ridiculous, he thought. The past is the past. He already made up his mind to forget it all. All those days he spent, those months he spent to erase them all.

And this man's presence was tearing it all down.

"You should've died that day." Kid finishes, closing his eyes and giving up.

"Feeling guilty now, are we? Is that why you let me in?"

For some reason why, Eustass Kid always liked hearing the man laugh. Trafalgar Law had a variety of laughs and smiles, a smile that indicated he was sad, lonely, or annoyed. A smile that suggested he was pleased, happy, or just in mood for sex.

"Give me a break Trafalgar."

Kid rolls over with his eyes closed, hands letting go of the neck in his hands. Turning his back on the man, he tries to ignore the arm that slithers on his back, drawing invisible circles.

_Or perhaps, _the darker man starts rambling, his eyes narrowing in a dangerous crescent. "You still love me too. Well it makes more sense that way. I always used to love you more than anyone. I still do, at least, I always loved you more than that woman."

Oh then of course, it starts something. Law knew he was walking on thin ice, but he can't help angering Kid. An angry Eustass Kid was very amusing. But maybe this time angered was an understatement. Infuriated was more the correct word.

The red eyes flash at him again, snapping open in the blink of an eye. White talons claw at the black hair, pulling them down and drawing out a sharp edged hiss from between Law's lips. The pain stings, but like addiction he can't stop. His words just come out to agitate the other more and more.

"Ow, this isn't nice."

"Don't you fucking dare, mention her in this."

It distorts everything between them; it was so pathetic that it makes Law sneer. "Oh, did I hit a nerve? This is wonderful. I have your attention now, don't I?" He spits out, laughing hysterically as the pain takes over his scalp. It hurts for no reason at all.

That moment in his past where he used to watch the children throw cats off the building for their entertainment. Betting which one would land the fastest, slowest and the one which would break more bones than the other. The sick distorted minds and their dark little smiles, it was like watching them again. Only this time, he was the one with that smile.

"She screamed to me to let her live. Begged, cried."

"Shut up!"

Kid screams, lifting and bashing the head in his hands off the sofa to the ground. The dull pain echoes at the back of Trafalgar's head, it crashes onto the carpet as the pale claws dig in through his pitch black hair.

"In the end she was still puny and weak to the ever last moment." The voice verdicts, putting a black little nail through the beating heart of Eustass Kid. Adrenaline rushes in, something that he was holding back explodes in a second.

A fist strikes hard against the darker man's cheeks. It was such a sudden blow even Trafalgar himself went wide eyed at the spurt of blood that cracked from his ripped lips and another bloody nose. The fishy smell of blood fills his senses. It paralyzes him like poison from a deadly viper. The liquid oozes from his face, burning the spot where the fist met his skin.

_Ouch, _Law shapes his lips, his throat slowly forming another sinister little chuckle. _Drown me in your attention. _It didn't matter if it was hate, he still got attention, and it was better than nothing.

"Drop your games. I'm sick of them." The pale man growls in a low pitch, only to hear an immediate answer which came in the form of tears. Kid was taken aback, his eyes giving away the shock he feels at the clear liquid that wells up at the corner of Trafalgar's eyes. Law seemed more surprised at this fact when he realized it, his fingers shaking at the thought of him crying.

With his lips mumbling something inaudible, Trafalgar Law is horrified at the tears that start running down his cheeks. They blend with his blood covered face, his petrified expression staring blankly at the face of Eustass Kid.

"I…" The grey eyed man croaks, "Still love you."

What he was crying about, Law didn't know. He had no idea, and he had no clue. But he felt so sad, and the sudden loneliness overwhelmed everything about his unstable emotions. Trafalgar Law was not known for functioning the same way as everyone else, as long as Eustass knew him, any rule that applied to a normal human being did not affect Law in the same way.

With everything so messed up, Kid was frozen in his position. Stopped dead with a bloody fist in his view- the sight of it alarms him. Two arms cage around the red haired man, hugging his neck and pulling him down. Eustass Kid does nothing to reject the lips that overlap onto his own, desperately engaging into a kiss that twists with every other movement with his body that coils around Kid's muscular frame.

I still love you.

I love you.

"I will make you love me again."

* * *

It was supposed to rain that morning but it didn't. The weather wasn't sunny, but it wasn't rainy either. It was just in between, murky grey and without any light or gradient. Somehow everyone was affected by the weather in the afternoon and maybe it had something to do with the fact that they had no sunlight for three days now.

However there was one individual who stood out above all others, his high school uniform proving useless to make him blend in with the other senior students roaming around the entrance ceremony for the new freshmen. Lanky and stylish in a weirdly repugnant way, the youth was wearing a pair of Jackie O' sunglasses in a cloudy grey weather. He stood there, under the trees with his hands tapping his thighs in a melancholy rhythm that squeaks from his headphones.

His messy shirt showed little of his olive skin through the opening of the buttons, a layer of his furred jacket covering his arms. Glimpses of ink could be caught on his arms and fingers, slender legs meet the ground with his high topped shoes and 2 inch heels.

Nobody dared approach him, his reputation exceeding the atmosphere around him. A vibrant man sits near the entrance of the auditorium with all the other freshmen, his scarlet eyes still and captivated by the sight of that dark haired senior. He had a peculiar smile on his face, the one that seemed to be observing something completely unrelated to anything.

"_There, that's Trafalgar Law. Never talk to him, never say anything to him. You watch out for him if you care about yourself. Mess his day and he'll mess with your life. To him, everyone's like little bugs waiting to be crushed under his boots."_

It was a rule.

Never talk to him, never get in his way. Never make him like you, never make him dislike you. And yet Kid stares, unable to avert his eyes from the man. It was his first time seeing him in person, and it captivates every last particle of his mind and soul.

Perhaps then, he had no idea what that feeling was. His heart beating fast, his eyes set on the darker figure.

"_He's… beautiful."_

And Eustass Kid, for the first time in his life fell in love.

From there, it started.

Their ugly little story.

* * *

**AU: **Thank you for the wonderful reviews, and favorites that you left me with. Originally this wasn't going to be a one-shot, and the only reason the first chapter ended up as a one-shot was because I had no idea what I wanted to do with the story.

Now I have a brief idea I want to expand on, and I thank you all for giving me positive comments. I appreciate them very much, thank you!

The story will be time skipping from the past to the present a few times, I'm going to make it as less confusing as I can.. but I really don't want to be putting things like 'OO years ago' headings onto every single bloody paragraph.


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